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Beyond the Lone Islands

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Saturday 15 August 2009

Raven's Wordzzle Challenge #76


The Slumber Party Mystery
Chapter 23 - Conversation in the kitchen

To read previous episodes, click the label "wordzzle" below this post.
For the rules of the game, and for more stories, go to Raven's Nest.


The words this week (10+5): superlative, flea market, falling leaves, disinformation, who was that masked man?, keeping kids out of trouble, I'm a believer, bonnet in the attic, staff, generation, deep in the forest, government, charming, heirlooms, flabbergasted

Choosing a corridor on his left lined with so many mysterious objects that it could easily have been mistaken for a flea market, Skittles eventually found his way through the staff quarters to the kitchen. There he found the butler busy with something at the sink, and William sitting at the table, talking. Like many others of his generation, the young man seemed to enjoy using superlatives in every other sentence. High risk of more disinformation, Skittles thought.

"… keeping kids out of trouble, that sort of thing," William said. " Do you remember when she found that old bonnet in the attic for Diana to wear to the fancy dress ball, but Diana convinced her to make her a Zorro costume instead? 'Who was that masked man?' people kept asking afterwards. William started to hum a tune that Skittles recognized as "I'm a believer", but interrupted himself when he became aware of Skittles standing in the doorway.

"Hello lieutenant. We're just talking of old times while waiting for falling leaves." Seeing Skittles' raised eyebrows, he quickly added:

"Sorry, it just feels like a waste of time to just sit around waiting. My boss will be furious that I didn't get back before closing time, and I still have tons of goods in the van that should have been delivered to other customers. Knowing my boss he won't think it reason enough that I saved a charming old gentleman and his heirlooms from being destroyed in a fire deep in the forest.

Skittles looked out of the window. He did not agree that a few trees in the garden was quite the same as "deep in the forest", but let it pass. He wasn't really interested in questioning William further, since the young man had clearly not arrived until after the fire had started. He told him so.

William looked flabbergasted.
"You mean I have been waiting around for nothing?" he groaned. For a moment, it seemed like he was going to add something rude, but then he just rose, and left through the kitchen entrance, muttering something in a very low voice between his teeth. Skittles thought he could distinguish the words "writing to the government".

Skittles turned to Bumblebee.

"I do, however, have a few more questions for you," he said. "Miss Diana says she saw Dr Challenge arrive here twice this afternoon. Can you confirm that?"

"Yes, sir," said the butler. "I did hear his car earlier, before I went outside with the drinks, and I remember saying to myself, 'That car really needs a new muffler', and then I saw it disappearing down the road. He does not usually come on Fridays. But Miss Diana had told me he would be coming for supper. I don't know if it was by her invitation, or the General's. I did not notice when he arrived - it must have been while I was not in the kitchen - and I wondered a bit why he left again, but thought that maybe he had had an emergency call or something. That would explain it, wouldn't it?"
"It might," said Skittles, adding to himself: If the doctor had not known that an emergency call could have been checked out, and had instead started talking nonsense about going home to change his shirt…

7 comments:

Raven said...

You are always so clever at working the words in seamlessly. My favorite thing you did this week was ".... keeping kids out of trouble." Great way to get it in without having to actually have a context around it. Wish I had thought of that.

DawnTreader said...

Five phrases this week!!! Not an easy job to fit them all in... ;)

Fandango said...

Well done as usual and more food for us dragons to think about. We like stories with kitchens.

Dr.John said...

I guess I have to learn to scroll down. Not used to people who just keep blogging and blogging. Glad you put up the new link.
It certainly was worth coming back and reading the latest episode.
Poor Skittles will this mystery/non mystery ever get solved ?

Reston Friends! said...

Skittles certainly gets a mental workout each week, but we wonder -- is that muscle increasing? Well done...

Argent said...

I have to echo Raven's comment about using one of the phrases as a conversation snippet. You did marvellously well with these phrases though. I found them quite a challenge myself this week. Argent.

CJ said...

Another great episode of Skittles. And I agree you did a great job on using the words and phrase.

I made a mistake on the link to my Wordzzle. You can find my story HERE.

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